Packing his bags less than 48 hours after his wedding last September, Scott Rockwell didn’t want to forget anything. As is the case many times when you travel, you just don’t know what you’ll need and you only have so much room.

When he pulled into West Jefferson, N.C., he was pretty sure he had brought the essentials — everything, that is, except his new bride.

Jena Rockwell was back in Wyalusing, Pa., while Scott, a journeyman lineman for Wysox-based Claverack Rural Electric Cooperative (REC), was part of a crew helping Blue Ridge Energy restore power to some 80,000 consumers after a catastrophic hurricane caused the worst damage the cooperative had ever seen.

Scott wouldn’t see his wife for another two weeks.

“It was pretty wild,” he says. “We had just gotten married on Saturday, and then on Sunday, we were home opening and reading through everybody’s cards when I got the call.

“My crew chief was asking if I was willing to go on storm duty,” he recalls, “and I said, ‘Well, geez, John, I’m always willing, but I don’t know if this is the best time.’ ”
 

So many unknowns

As the couple prepared for their big day, they knew a major hurricane was brewing. Guests had canceled trips to Pennsylvania to deal with flooding after Helene made landfall Sept. 26 as a Category 4 storm at Florida’s Big Bend. But the storm’s continuing path of destruction — into Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina — had eluded them.

“I was in the kitchen, and I heard him say, ‘I’m going to have to talk to my wife and get back to you,’ ” Jena says. “I knew right then what the call was about. As much as I didn’t want him to go, I knew it was what they needed. They needed him way more than I did.”

Minutes later, Scott was back on the phone, and hours later, he was in his truck, heading south.

“I’m an emotional person to begin with and then to have all the emotions from the wedding ... you don’t process it all while it’s happening,” Jena says. “The next day, you finally wind down and sit and start to think about it, and it all just hit me. Then the call came.”

Jena threw herself into her work as a teacher at Wyalusing Area School District in Bradford County. The couple were planning to take their honeymoon during the school’s December break, so she was back in the classroom the Tuesday after her wedding.

“I’m very routine-oriented, so having my job, honestly, kept me sane,” she says. “Scott and I are both very independent people, but you don’t realize how big someone’s presence is until they’re not there.”

And, this time around, there were just so many unknowns.

“Typically, when he goes on storm [duty], I know he’s four hours away and he’ll be gone for three days, but knowing [North Carolina was] completely wrecked, I didn’t know if I could talk to him … I didn’t know where he would be located,” Jena says. “There was no end time — even when he was there, there was never an end time. It was so much harder.”

Communication was spotty, too; long workdays and a compromised cellular grid made connecting a challenge.

“Depending on where he was, he could or couldn’t check in. I could see his location sometimes (on her cellphone) and know that he moved that day,” says Jena, who would usually get a quick call at night when Scott returned to his room after an 18-hour shift. “I go to bed early, and he’d call a couple hours into my sleep, but I had to answer. It was the only time I got to talk to him.”
 

Family, friends and a life of service

Next door in Susquehanna County, Rockwell wedding guests Dave Gardner and Faythe Caines also said their goodbyes that Sunday as Dave, another Claverack lineworker, left for Georgia. Faythe and baby Eleanor settled in for the long haul.

“He’s never been away for that long. He’ll work a storm around here and he usually comes home at night for a couple of hours, but this was definitely different,” Faythe says. “Missing him was a challenge, and then I was doing the things that he would be doing if he was home.” 

The early October chill in the air meant the woodstove would need to be tended, and the usual household chores wouldn’t wait. “I had all of those things, as well as the baby,” she says.

Little Eleanor was 7 months old at the time, and for the next 10 days, family and friends, including Dave’s Claverack co-workers, gathered around to help Faythe and their daughter.

“Throughout the time that Dave was away with the other Claverack linemen, some of their wives and girlfriends … we’d all message each other and talk about missing them and just made sure that we were all OK,” Faythe says, adding she was grateful for the understanding and camaraderie.

A similar group chat over in Indiana County provided the same support when cooperative lineworkers there were also sent to North Carolina to help after the hurricane.

“We would message each other; it let us know that we were there for each other,” Lisa Jablunovsky says of her fellow “line wives,” whose husbands work for REA Energy Cooperative in Indiana, Pa.

A veteran “line wife” herself, Lisa says family support helped her navigate her husband AJ’s absence. With a full-time job and two boys, Lisa knew she would be juggling a lot — and she didn’t know for how long. Ultimately, AJ spent 15 days with Blue Ridge Energy in Sparta, N.C.

“Once our parents reassured us [they could help],” Lisa says, “we felt a lot better knowing we would make it work.”

That family support meant Bennett, 10, would get to football practice on time; his brother, Landon, 13, would get to his dirt bike races; and Lisa, a nurse at Indiana Regional Medical Center, could answer after-hours calls. With her medical background, Lisa knew what AJ’s presence meant in North Carolina.

“It would be hard to turn [the request] down. That’s how I feel in my line of work, too. You don’t ever want to tell anybody ‘no’ when it comes to something like this, especially something this drastic,” she says. “They need you. I wish I could have gone and been there right beside him, just to help with the rescue efforts.”
 

'What is he going into?'

Like the other wives, Lisa knew this trip was different — far from the usual thunderstorm clean-up. When AJ would send photos, he told his wife they didn’t capture the scope of the damage: the homes, landscapes, roads and bridges that were destroyed. And when she logged onto the internet to see for herself, Lisa quickly found the scope of the situation overwhelming.

“I got on the (Blue Ridge Energy) Facebook page to see the updates,” she says. “It was nice to see them restoring power, but I found myself watching too many videos of houses washing away and all the devastation, so I stopped doing that for a little bit. When he first left, I thought, ‘What is he going into?’ ”

Ironically, at other times, that same technology provided comfort for the family.

“It was reassuring that we could talk to him each night — that helped … just being able to hear his voice,” says Lisa, who would have to wait until the end of AJ’s 18-hour shift to make contact. “We did share each other’s location (on their smartphones). I would have an idea of the general area where he was traveling, and if he couldn’t call me, I would know that he was still moving around.

“But he’s great at what he does,” she adds. “All the guys he went with are great at what they do, and they had a great [North Carolina] crew they were working with. I knew they’d be OK.”

When they realized it would be a while before AJ returned home, the Jablunovskys settled into a routine. 
“We’ve had him go out for several days locally, so the first few days, it really didn’t affect us. But then, after a while, we’re like, OK, we’re really missing Dad now,” Lisa says, with son Bennett adding that even the dogs’ moods changed the longer AJ was gone.

The couple give their sons a lot of credit for helping to keep things together during AJ’s absences. “When they were little, it was just me,” Lisa says. “I had to do it all, but now I have helping hands.”

That, says AJ, is what allows him to do what he does: Leave home at all hours of the day and night to help others.

“If they weren’t supportive,” he adds, “I don’t know how I would do this.”
 

Remembering North Carolina

Although AJ is back home, North Carolina has stayed with the family. AJ often thinks about the people he encountered — those who lost everything and likely still don’t have power, and those who appreciated every act of kindness.

Emotions still bubble up when he remembers the woman who broke down in tears when the REA Energy crew pulled into her driveway. “She just hugged her husband,” AJ says. “She knew we were there to help.”
“Just knowing that their dad and my husband was one of the ones out there helping was super rewarding for us,” Lisa adds. “We’re just so proud.”

In all, 11 cooperatives from Pennsylvania and New Jersey were able to send crews to Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina to help restore power after Hurricane Helene. Each of those lineworkers had family back home — loved ones like Lisa, Bennett, Landon, Jena, Faythe and little Eleanor — who stood behind them, insisting that they go and do all they could and telling them not to worry, everything would be fine at home. Because that’s the co-op way.